1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to mobile devices and, more particularly, to handheld communication and/or media devices.
2. Description of Related Art
As the world becomes more mobile, a variety of devices are available to allow individuals to communicate with one another or allow the individuals to access a number of different media sources, including audio and video entertainment sources. Smart phones are available, not only to allow individuals to talk to one another, but also to download music, videos, television programs and movies. Smartphones also now allow individuals to access the Internet and access various sites on the web. Furthermore, Internet access allows individuals to reach and interact with social sites, such as Facebook™. Today's smartphones also incorporate cameras so that photo and video images can be transmitted to others.
Likewise other devices are available to perform various functions noted above, which lets a user perform a variety of tasks that involve audio, video and other file sharing with others connected to the user through various communication channels. For example, handheld media accessing devices are now utilized for accessing various media sources. Such handheld devices include tablet devices, tablet PCs (personal computers) and book readers, just to name a few.
With these various handheld devices, the viewing screen is a touch sensitive screen that allows a user to provide user input through tactile interaction, typically by touching the display with a finger. The screen area is typically rectangular in shape and allows a user to rotate the device for either portrait or landscape orientation. The display image will then adjust to either orientation, depending on how the device is held. In most of these devices, some mechanism will sense the difference in how the device is held by the user to provide the correct orientation.
However, with these handheld devices, typically only one particular type of input/output (I/O) device (or sensor) is present for the device. For example, only one microphone or one speaker is present on the face of the device. One exception is a smartphone that now incorporates a camera on the side with the display facing the user and a second camera on the opposite side facing away from the user. None of these devices duplicate an I/O device on the display side facing the user.
A problem with having only one particular I/O device type on the side having the display is that one or more of these device(s) may be covered when the handheld device is rotated to a different orientation. For example, a camera at a top face edge of a tablet device in one orientation (e.g. landscape orientation) may be covered by the user's hand(s) when rotated to a second orientation (e.g. portrait orientation). Even if the camera is not covered by a hand, the second orientation places the camera at a side edge, which is not a desirable location for video communication. The same type of situation may occur with other I/O devices, such as a microphone and/or a speaker.
Therefore, a need exists to provide a more user friendly location of I/O device(s) in a handheld device that takes into account the orientation of the display.